Don't believe the hype

The WaPo reported on Saturday that since the year 2000, RU-486 has been linked to seven fatalities. It looks like the deaths may somehow be connected to a rarely fatal bacterium, but the connection is tenuous at best, and investigation still needs to be done. Of course, this hasn't stopped the lifers from urgently calling for the drug's removal: "RU-486 is a deadly drug that is killing pregnant women," Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), who has co-sponsored a bill to take the drug off the market pending a review, said in a statement. "This drug should never have been approved, and it must be suspended immediately."

Uh-huh. I think Ezra has the most pithy response to this (emphasis mine):

To put things in context, we know of 560,000 RU-486 abortions, and there appear to have been seven deaths -- that's 1.25 deaths per 100,000, which you can compare and contrast with childbirth, at 17 deaths per 100,000. As for the pharmaceutical comparison, that's about par for the course. Everyday drugs kill around 90,000 Americans a year, though they save exponentially more. To see how some of the name brand medication you routinely use stack-up, check this page. Meanwhile -- don't listen to the hype. RU-486 is no more dangerous than anything else, and, in fact, significantly safer than actual childbirth, surgical abortions, and a slew of widely-used drugs.